By the Judicial Plan of 1774, the office of the Collector cum District Magistrate was temporarily renamed Diwan or Amil.

"[8][9][10] The office of a collector during the British Raj held multiple responsibilities – as collector, he was the head of the revenue organization, charged with registration, alteration, and partition of holdings; the settlement of disputes; the management of indebted estates; loans to agriculturists, and famine relief.

Romesh Chandra Dutt, Sripad Babaji Thakur, Anandaram Baruah, Krishna Govinda Gupta and Brajendranath De were the first five Indian ICS officers to become Collectors.

Law and order was an important subject in the United Provinces and the post continues to be known as the District Magistrate in present-day Uttar Pradesh.

In non-regulation provinces like Punjab, Burma, Assam and Oudh, a simpler form of administration prevailed with many elements of the Criminal Procedure Code suspended and the DM functioning as the District and Sessions Judge as well.

[13] The District Collector/District Magistrate is provided with Personal Security Officers, including armed guards, to ensure their safety and protection.

The first major change came about in the early 1960s as the Judiciary was separated from the Executive in most Indian states in line with Article 50 of the Constitution of India.

Indirectly, this led to a loss of direct control over the police which now depended on the District Judge and the Judicial Magistrates.

In the Union Territories and the North Eastern states, Collectors continued to exercise judicial power for much longer.

[39][40][41][42] There have also been many instances where at lower levels, district magistrates have pressurized victims or their family members, especially if they belong to the marginalized community[43] Kolkata in West Bengal does not have a conventional collector.

The Magisterial powers are exercised by a Police Commissioner, one of the earliest such posts in British India, while the Kolkata Municipal Corporation takes care of all other responsibilities.